Konoha Underground
by goddessa39
Summary: Unrelated one-shots, drabbles, and inspired scenes of Uzumaki Naruto. For those who love the knucklehead-in-orange-Naruto, try some of these. Latest chapter: A Prophecy
1. Dark Hero

**Konoha Underground**

Inspirational:** Dark Hero**

M for Mature, just in case…

Naruto belongs to Kishimoto, and not me. If you think I do own it, then get a reality check. I am just playing for a while.

Konoha Underground is just a bunch of one-shots, drabbles, or scene ideas that I have cranked out, but know I am not going to finish.

Pairings: There is no one pairing, but the likelihood for Naruto/Hinata is very high.

Characters: I am fond of Naruto, Hinata, Sandaime, Ayame, and Tsunade. Just about anyone else may be edited, changed, overly OOC, and bashed. Of course, this is me so the likelihood of OOC of any and all characters is a definite.

* * *

><p>Recommended story of this chapter:<p>

The Wrath of a Woman Scorned

By: EDelta88

Summary: A Hidden Village is not a safe place for a little girl if nobody comes when she screams, one night the village goes too far and now Konoha shall reap what it has sown. Dark!Fem!Naru Pairings: Decided but secret

* * *

><p><strong>The Dark Hero<strong>

A dark Naruto that does not know love or trust.

Inspired by one of _EDelta88'_s forum inspirationals…

* * *

><p><em>No one would ever mention aloud the irony of Uzumaki Naruto, Hyuuga Hinata, and Uchiha Sasuke being on the same team. It was a harsh and dark mirror, a twisted incarnation of twenty something years before when Namikaze Minato, Hyuuga Hiashi, and Uchiha Fugaku were on a Gennin team under the Toad Sannin, Jiraiya. But then, Sasuke was the last Uchiha in the village and Hinata was nothing but useless to her father. And Naruto... well... no one would admit as to whose blood ran in his veins. Six scars on an unmarked yet ravaged body meant more than honoring the dead.<em>

* * *

><p>The night was cool and the streets of Konohagakure no Sato was as empty as any other night. Near the slums to the South-East of the Village Hidden in the Leaves a lone figure slid through the normal back alleys of the civilian paths, ignoring the ninja highway on the upper levels of the buildings due to the visibility of those unmarked pathways. There was no other man or woman outside near the lone figure and the houses were closed up for the night even in the poorer sections of the town.<p>

A sandaled pair of feet moved without a sound through the thickening darkness, trailing through a dark puddle as if it were not there, solid as the flawless cement. Night was settling in like a bag of dark sludge being wrapped around the head of a tied-down captive. It tightened ever so slowly and the knots that were creaking could be heard in the calls of a night when the buildings were struck by fierce winds that swung open against locks by a fierce, oncoming storm.

One of the sidewalk lights that littered the area threw a weak beam at the moving figure. Even through the winds that were grabbing up litter in the streets like spare change did not cross this particular street light. The dim color hit a face that was bound to be nicely chiseled with a firm chin and almond eyes, if he got some proper nutrients into him.

Bold blonde hair edging on to the color yellow or cleaned gold ingots spiked up in messy fuzz. It had likely not been combed overly much and the air from moving rapidly had long since mussed it up further. As he passed further into the light, it became apparent that his identity was that of a well-known and hated figure within the ninja village of Fire Country. Uzumaki Naruto was young but his steps were firm and quiet. The vibrating world around him moved fitfully but did little to affect him. As he walked, his feet made not a sound as he graced the light momentarily like a ghost by the houses and apartment buildings in the area.

Then the boy was gone from the light, as if he was never noticed or paid any special attention by the solid objects, natural forces, or ninja in the village alike. There was no one around the slums where he lived to see him anyway. It was late and the night was empty save for those who drank the dark like poppies to sunlight. After all, there were buds and jasmine that bloomed under a glowing, yellow moon.

Behind the figure that had since disappeared trailed a thin layer of blood before stopping as he scuffed his shoed foot against a dirty door mat. Afterwards, there was no trace of him.

The storm bothered him little. After he disappeared from the one lamp in the slum of SE Konoha, the winds died down and the night was again still.

* * *

><p>He stepped without a sound through the opening dawn morning. Dew that had collected on the walls and plants the night before gathered heavily against dirty windows just beginning to shine in the light. The daylight began its warming decent to the ground. A large bowl of fresh dango from a street stall was handed over without a word and he set the perfect amount of credits on the metal table like offerings to Kami and Yami. The cook behind the counter did his best not to whimper at the presence of the hated boy-thing, but knew better than to refuse him. It had been many years since any store had refused him anything. Between the two, no word was said and there was no actual contact. Uzumaki Naruto was not what one would call a regular but he had only gotten one order from the small stall since it had opened, and he was memorable.<p>

He munched on the small meal as the sun inched above the far horizon that sparkled behind one particularly tall cropping of trees in the distance. The dango was acceptable, but mostly it was one of the few cheap and open eateries between the slums where his apartment was located and the Ninja Academy that he was traveling to.

Room 17 of the Ninja Academy dawned bright and early with a grouping of various newly tested Gennin.

Inuzuka Kiba flipped a flat coin in his hand as his companion animal watched from the cuddled space of his lap. Near him, the Nara heir leaned heavily against the top of his desk, softly snoring as if this was any other day. But then, he was always like that. Beside him, a large boy, and Akimichi, munched away on a family sized bag of potato chips as if they were only a handful. Every few moments there was a familiar sound of the bag being touched and moved, and a handful of potato chips being eaten comfortably. That first corner in the room was relatively quiet compared to the rest.

In contrast, the middle section of the classroom was somewhat loud. Sasuke sat with his head down and his hands over his ears doing his best to keep out the high pitch voices of the two girls- thankfully the only two of his fan girls that had passed the tests the day before. In a way, he was thankful. For one, it lessened the chances of him having to be on a team with some of the really perverted girls that were obsessed with him. On the other hand, he had a higher likelihood on being on a team with either of the two most loud and shrieking of them all.

He gave a sigh of annoyance as Yamanaka Ino and Haruno Sakura screeched above him like banshees over something as stupid as who got the single seat next to him. Occasionally he was tempted to sit in the middle of the aisle instead of on the walkthrough, but had shivered so hard he had coughed at the thought of being surrounded by pre-Kunoichi with perverted thoughts about him on all sides. Some of them he knew were really clingy that taking a kunai to arms just had them convinced that self-harm was a turn-on.

It really, really wasn't.

It was times like those that had him wondering why he did not just ask Itachi nicely to put him out of his misery when he could have those few years ago.

On the far side of the room, Aburame Shino sat tall and almost lonely in his large coat. The buzzing of his insects was audible to his neighbors but most had learned to turn out that particular level of creepiness. Near him was Hyuuga Hinata with her dark hair pulled up in a tight pony-tail that was pulled like a fan to cascade down the sides of her face. Her bangs were cropped short and straight to hang over her forehead. It was only the light purple of her usual outfit that told the world that under the Hyuuga-dark hair she was a bluenette.

Hinata was staring out into the space of the front room like a statue with her pupiless, pale eyes. She was a quiet person, but whether it was a natural characteristic of the unusual Hyuuga girl or if it was an effect of the abuse her Clan Head of a father had heaped upon her since her mother died, as well as Hizashi, it was never quite clear.

Unlike the rest of the others in the class, however, Hinata was different in that she was not waiting for class to begin by sitting idly. No, she was watching the classrooms nearby and retracing walking patterns. She was waiting for someone. She was waiting for Him.

Her face gained a pink hue as if holding back a blush. Anyone that was paying attention would have noted the frequency of this because exactly three minutes later a golden-haired boy walked into the class at a comfortable pace of a daily stroll. There was a lull in the general classroom buzz as everyone turned to him in an unconscious acknowledgement before going back to their own actions as if it had never happened. Still, there was a vibrating current in the area now that every aspiring ninja could notice.

Uzumaki Naruto walked slowly to the far side of the room with his blue eyes near to closing. His black jacket and pants had a hint of dark orange subtleties like the usual Jounin swirls as well as a single patch of the same print in white. Many had wondered as to what the extra swirl was for but few took the time to think about it overly much. The basic swirling pattern could be found on any Jounin jacket, and while it was harder to find alternately, it was not completely unheard of. Anyone who cared to look would find the swirl on every outfit the young ninja owned, but not many paid it any attention.

Most adults hated him, his classmates knew, but for what reason it could not be said. Because at the same time, most feared him, and it made Uchiha Sasuke more worried than jealous because, those who saw him knew, that Naruto was a strange creature of both strength and mystique and if Jounin and grown ninja feared him, then what could they do about it?

Exactly.

At the same time though, the other rookies had gotten used to him, sort of expected him to show up with his presence occasionally in a live-and-let-live way that their older peers and parents had not adopted.

Pity for the stupid because mercy was not something Naruto dabbled in.

None of them really stopped to sit by him or talk with him specifically. He had no one that was more than a passing acquaintance. But at the same time… Uzumaki Naruto was the rookies version of an adopted madman. Well, to everyone but one person.

The mysterious boy moved to sit in the far row where Hinata was doing her best but failing not to look at him. I thank Kami for the Byakugan, Hinata thought to herself. She did not need to face him to see every inch of him from his blonde hair to his impressive physique to his- Kami, her face went red like one of Sasuke's favored tomatoes and she began to grow faint. But then, the class in particular had grown to expect that as well.

Naruto gave a sigh as the girl calmed herself down and looked up at him, watching as he moved to sit. He did not work to sit near her, but it was well-known where he would sit. The Ninja Academy did not have assigned seating but it was a natural psychological thing for humans and animals like them to put claim on things for an idea of normality. She was such a strange girl, always looking at him with those beaten doe eyes. And yet he never really tossed her aside.

He did not like her, or trust her. He did not consider her a friend. Truthfully, he just did not see the point. In the words of the only true naturally-born genius in the class, it would be too troublesome to toss her to the side. Some day, she might come in handy.

Hinata did not particularly bother him or cause him stress. There was just no reason why he should expand the energy to bat her away when she meant no harm in it.

* * *

><p>Silently, he rushed through a bank of the damp, swampy area and headed for his female teammate. He could track the others by tracks in the mud or against the trunks of the trees where feet occasionally made a dent, but he did not. Naruto followed the scent of his female teammate, and the fluctuating chakra of a fight nearby. The hairs on his ears twitched as he flickered from tree stump to tree stump, never quite touching the alligator-infested waters below.<p>

Although, even if he had, no animal would have tried to touch him. Maybe it was his confidence, maybe it was his skill, but there was just something about him that spoke of an aura of 'touch me and die.' Nothing truly animal-minded would ignore that unless they were starving or rabid.

Humans did not count. Humans were stupid. Humans had learned to ignore their baser instincts in a genius move that would likely kill them all off, eventually.

Quickly, he dodged a kunai and two senbon thrown in close quarters before the air around him moved like a second, or dozen, set of hands. They crushed an oncoming chain weapon like a ball of common mud. A ninja dressed in dark clothing from head to toe jumped out of the brush [and out of a genjutsu the ninja was hiding beneath] and prepared to take a deadly strike before the 34 inch hardwood bokken gave a harsh snap as it hit the shield of forced air that Naruto ejected away from himself.

Naruto's momentary opponent gave out a harsh breath and winced against the force of it. His fists still grasped around the bokken handle hit the air shield as well and was followed by the rest of the body. It was likely the harmed person was a young man slightly older than himself but Naruto felt nothing for the being but annoyance at holding him up, if only for a moment.

But experience told him that mere moments could be a week in battle time.

As the black clothed ninja ricochet off of the air shield along with his broken weapon, Naruto sent off a series of a dozen kunai and senbon created only out of air that cut through the body, killing the other almost instantly before he hit the ground to fall beneath the murky water. Uzumaki Naruto had hardly looked at his dead opponent, and has never stopped moving through an invisible path of the rough branches.

But he did not care that another had died-all ninja died and if he was a cause of a few deaths, it was nothing but others dismissing the danger they could sense. The Leaf ninja was heading forward by the time his weapons [created from his best and favored element] disintegrated back into transparent air. He was over a mile away by the time he began to register the sound of fighting. His pace increased to almost the speed of sound. Naruto found he was just in time to save his teammates in the act of defeating the enemy.

In an area rich of folding stumps, the Uchiha lay wounded on the ground. A red stream was beginning to flow from a spot on his chest. A rib had broken against skin, apparently. Naruto gave a look around the small wooded area. It took him less than a second to make a thorough detail of what had most likely occurred, something every survivor did or died without. One surprisingly ugly ninja wearing a headband marked with the crossed out musical note of Orochimaru's village above a single bloodshot eye had been standing over the Uchiha about to make a strike that would have possibly killed the ninja beloved by the Leaf when the female of Team 7 had shot out to kick the sword away.

She had been met with a sold kick to the belly but had saved her teammate for a brief moment. Fortunately for Team 7's survival, it had been just enough to save them. Naruto took a deep breath without looking away before activating one of the abilities of his air shield. Tiny fissures opened in his shield from every side, running through him and disappearing as if going into a sealed world beyond the normal world of the Elemental Nations. Each tube was curled and laced with chakra before he, for lack of a better word, _pulled_.

The air around him in a thirty foot diameter became very solid and the enemy Nin were frozen as if in time or concealed within translucent Jell-O. None of the eight trained people in the area could move or even breathe.

Although it only lasted about fifteen seconds, those moments were not empty. Hinata was pulled backwards, further away from the frontal enemy. In her path lay a vacant and still area, a vacuum in space. Her lungs tried to breathe in but it was as if the thickened air was no longer air. In contrast, Sasuke was not moved but a thin space of air directly above him thickened into a waxy consistency as if a gaseous substance danced above him, as if his soul had climbed out in the action and was fighting to get away. The Uchiha's body twitched as his lungs fought for air it could not get and it was likely if he did not get oxygen soon he might undergo a seizure that would negatively affect him further do to his smashed ribcage.

Veins popped out from the easygoing contours along Naruto's face and hands as he held the solid stage for more than a second of controlled time where people were within it that he did not intend to harm.

A section farthest from the air shield conductor began to falter and one of the enemy nin was killed immediately as some of the air fell down with the force of gravity and crushed the body like a grape, sinking it down into a completely flat construct equal only to the mass equal to the original shape.

In contrast, Naruto was not having as much trouble controlling another area far against the edge of his acquired space. One of the enemy in the back tried to conjure lightning in his gloves but it fizzled around him as if he was rubbed against a balloon to create simple static. When that one nin attempted to do the same thing again it backfired and instantly fried his hands that were doing the conducting. This one did not die but the man's own actions had put him out of action.

Veins had traveled down Naruto's body and had made themselves reach to his arms and even his hands had begun to bulge with overworked tubes. His chakra was massive so he was having no trouble with the amount, but the structures he was sending messages with, like synapses sending to the brain, were wearing down.

It only took a single thought to end it, but the air did no simply cease to exist or snap out of solidity. It seems to flow back towards Naruto as he breathed in sharply. He took all of the little air pockets he had created and all of the tubes he had used to pass on information like a secondary nervous system and pulled them in as if clenching a fist. However, everything has to go somewhere. Unlike the ninja with the bokken he had killed on the run, Uzumaki used his fists to direct a series of tiny senbon needle shapes towards restricted nin on the leader's left. One string of chakra the jinchuuriki waved over like a monkey's tail towards the other living enemy nin. It roped around the chest of the shortest of the lot and squeezed, downing the last of the group.

The rest of the stretched air Naruto directed seemed to coalesce en masse behind him, which would have frightened any person who had ever been willing to physically follow him because it decimated some and disintegrated other pieces of the wood and ground behind him in a clear five foot area. The rounded crater behind him steamed and the edges kept the thin layer of water from tumbling into it.

The missing ninja that had been in charge of physically harming his teammates was pulled into the vacuum that Naruto had left behind. Head-first, the tall missing ninja of Otogakure fell into the voided area. He did not disintegrate like the ash of the trees behind the yellow-haired Konoha nin. No. Instead, the first seven inches of him ceased to exist as the air yanked on him in a fine red mist that disappeared before it hit the beaten grass.

In the aftermath was a crew of five ninja taken down. A close range fighter had been decapitated, but there was no head in sight. Two more had been wounded and had died without much of a blink. Each had small holes that, if stood up, could be seen from the back and front without anything in-between. The other two enemies were standing only for a moment before both fell. Both looked strangely gaunt. The guy whose hands had been fried by friendly fire began screaming in pain as chakra traveled backwards on paths it should have never sparked that way. The hole in his stomach with a clean edge had been filled by his own intestines as the force of gravity pulled everything downwards. There was a wet sounding plop which was also the second loudest movement in the half-minute between Naruto arriving in the clearing and the majority of the enemy ninja passing into death. The other fell straight because his midsection, arms and chest, had been constricted inwards. It was likely he could not breathe still and likely would not last long. Thin pockets of air had solidified before knotting and braiding together to create an invisible sort of rope.

Naruto just gave him a glance around. He wondered if he should kill the guy who was screaming but had little to no actual preference to either so ignored it. There was no danger left in them, even if the screaming was getting annoying.

It was a simple movement of taking the air around them all and shifting the oxygen around the screaming nin to a point that would make the madman shut the fuck up. Death was something that would come to all ninja, but in the meantime, there were questions to be asked and information to be gotten… especially while the getting was still possible and worthwhile to the Konoha T&I.

Sasuke and Hinata were in better forms than the enemy but that wasn't saying much. Sasuke was wide eyed on the ground staring upwards into the sky as if it contained answers he was searching for before they fell as his head was too affected with gravity. As he neared his teammates, Naruto could see the wide-eyed stare of the other male Leaf nin whose eyes were pointed towards him in astonishment. In those eyes was fear and wariness that had not been so embraced before. Sasuke's breathing was harsh and irregular, saying to his teammates that even if there was only one broken rib, there was internal damage and a case of the shocks.

It was likely that the yellow haired young man would have grinned at him, sharpened incisors digging into red lips, as only an animal could show that prey and food and beings below him.. But Hyuuga Hinata was on all fours coughing up blood as her back spasmed.

"I'm going to want your opinions on what it felt like to be on the wrong side of my air shield," he said simply, instead. Sasuke was still looking at him, fear plain in his eyes as he fought to remain breathing. Hinata continued coughing but said nothing about it. The little doe had been beaten in her heart so bad that she did not even think of it.

"Na-" cough "Naruto." She took in a shaky breath and another. He said nothing, but went towards her. She did not seem to be acknowledging him, at first. She whispered in strangled segments his name but did not look for him. She tested words upon her lips like the blood that speckled her Hyuuga-pale skin until the words came out in credible pieces.

"Naruto." This time she bent her head and watched as he neared her broken figure. This time, she called for him, calling with her eyes and her voice and her curves of distress but she expected nothing.

He looked at her with the usual lack of emotion on his face, but also with a little of the scorn showing. "How are you going to get strong enough to survive if you keep sacrificing yourself?" he asked. It was a rhetorical question, not something to be answered.

"You came," she said softly, her voice soft and silent in wonder. Sasuke might have heard it if it wasn't for the strangled wheezing of the victim whose body was crushed. Naruto heard her easily with his over-active senses.

The air around them, though back to being usable oxygen, was still charged. Little bits of electricity in the form of skin shocks and static electricity that had built up. Sasuke's hair was crawling upwards from its messy abode. Hinata's own styled hair that had fallen away from its long braid had hair ends that were crawling away from the style. Naruto, in contrast, looked no different than usual. Despite the fact that he had moved positions, Naruto could feel the area around him as if a thousand fingers were tracing its shaky details. Without a hand sign, the jinchuuriki of the sleeping Kyuubi no Kitsune directed three Kage Bunshins out of the area. One threw an air senbon towards the screaming enemy nin to shut him up and he collapsed unconscious, hands still crispy black and shaking. The second Kage Bunshin gathered the deceased bodies and began looting through them. Though there was still one awake enemy-nin, the body was pushed against the corpses and divested of any obvious weapons. The body would be gone through when it died to be scavenged for useful information, usable items, and eventually a head for T&I to play around with.

The third Kage Bunshin went towards Sasuke to see if the Gennin would live. His death, as the Nara of the Rookie's year would say, would be "too troublesome to deal with."

Naruto himself kneeled next to the still coughing female who had attached herself to him, then laid a hand over her, pushing his index and center finger of his right hand into her back just where her lungs would be within her ribcage. He pushed inwards with more than just his digits, and the air, as she breathed got thicker with oxygen to make it easier on her throat and lungs for the moment. It was, she felt, like strings fell into her mouth and roped up what should not be there like extra blood and stray bits of water.

When she felt slightly better and stopped coughing up blood, she sat down on her knees and stood slowly. Naruto quit with his actions, wondering why he had helped her in the first place if she did not need it. But he shrugged and put the actions out of his mind. The only thing that separated the humans as a species from the monkeys, after all, was curiosity, or maybe stupidity.

Hinata began to infuse herself with the pale colored chakra of healing techniques and fixed the minor damage in herself before doing what she could for the single Konoha Uchiha.

It was only about ten minutes before Naruto divested the Snake Sannin's old ninja of their belongings that their Team Sensei broke through the newly made edge of the clearing. He stopped when he saw them to take stock of the damage before smiling brightly in a strange way and walking over to his dark haired students. Kakashi jumped slightly as a charged particle within the air jumped out and bit him like a friendly dog, finding an immediate connection. The Hatake did, after all, have a lightning-friendly chakra pattern.

His blonde student, Hatake Kakashi noticed, had sat himself on a stump to begin reading through the scrolls of the enemies. The spoils of battle were a ninja's main resource of jutsu not native to clan or country research besides what they were taught personally or created on their own.

They would question the unconscious enemy from the five-man-crew when he was sure the darker haired pair of Gennin were both alright.

* * *

><p>Naruto looked down at the woman beneath him. Her dark hair framed her face against his pillow which contrasted against her pale skin laid bare. Her neck was long, like that of a swan and bared towards him as if even in her sleep she was begging him to claim her, to see worth in her she had never found in herself.<p>

Completely naked, Uzumaki found he could gaze appreciating at all of her. He had a thought about her he found odd; that he would rather have her than the most beautiful or powerful or deadly woman in the world. Maybe he had just gotten used to her over time, like a foot dipped into frozen water for so long it burned within a room temperature pool. Like the way the hatred of the village fell weightlessly off of his back but any kind word was alien.

Or maybe he did love her. Maybe this string within him that led him towards her in a village full of people as if she was the only one around for miles was the sort of pull that she felt, that other people felt for their own spouses and friends.

Looking down had her midsection, he took an easy breath. He knew that it did not matter. In the end, he was an animal. He had a physical heart and lungs and the legs of any other homo sapien, and they were all animals. Naruto was just more honest about it. Because with the vaguely swelling section bare, he could admit to himself yet again that he had no problem being an animal. As the abused and tortured child of a village, the pariah always hated, he still faced certain... habits. He sought food and water, shelter, and to live. Then there was Hinata.

Sex was a familiar scene in his life, being from the streets and all, but he had never really looked at adding back to the gene pool of the future himself. He learned. He killed. He existed for the sake of existing. And yet... Hinata. It always came back to her when he became more than animal, or maybe the extracted animal within the human being. It was Hinata the made him more than animal, but also less.

With a quiet sigh he put his mouth to her open neck, laid bare before him, and proceeded to do what instincts within him that held no name had urged him to do for a long time. Carefully, he bit down with sharpened teeth. In her sleep, she gave a heady moan and leaned into him. It was so reflexive a thing built into her that her eyes did no more than flicker beneath eyelids. She did not wake as one arm reached for him and the other reached up to grip something else solid.

With the animal inside of him, he bit into her skin, a dollop of blood leaking out of his mouth and onto damp sheets. His tongue searched out the skin and rubbed at the reddened flesh as he let go. Through this, Hinata slept on, but even with her eyes closed and her mind resting, her naked body rubbed against his own in the way only a woman could conduct.

As he stood, naked as the day he was born, he pushed some of his blankets to her back to shape to her form in his place, and pulled up the comforter that had fallen on the floor in the night. Softly, he tucked his mate into the bed, _his bed_, with a quick touch to her belly.

He was an animal and a possessive one at that. It was time to defeat a beast before it could come after His.

* * *

><p><strong>END.<strong>

Okay, I wanted to do more, maybe flush out something for the Wave mission, and his reactions to his new team. I figure he could probably find out the idea of team work. If anyone wants to include these bits, go for it, _just please inform me if you do._

I had planned to give him a sort of summon. A fox summons would be more obvious because he is slightly more in touch with his inner animal, even if it is not Kyuubi. However, with his strong connection to wind, I thought of some birds, but I could not really decide on what.

I do not like Sasuke, though I feel sorry for him about the fan girls. Those creatures are insane. Most of the other Rookies I can be fond of, but I am not particularly close to any of them, so if I use them, it is not going to be everywhere. Kakashi is a character I don't really care for either, but he there are good fics out there where he is cool.

I had planned to make Naruto's original trauma that completely changed him being the malignant burning of Ichiraku Ramen, Ayame, and Teuchi. I had a whole praying to a ramen shrine in a temple in my head where Naruto only ate the food of the gods once a day in large quantities. But I never got my fingers to go with it.

The 'Dark Hero' idea is from an inspirational forum which could use more comments on the character page of _EDelta88_. I recommend checking it out.

* * *

><p><em>…another Short for Dark Hero… just a day in the life of a ninja. (I don't know where this came from. It was just already there. If there was a point to it, I don't remember what it was.)<em>

**Omake**

A Naruto who does not know love is an animal. But even animals can react.

The failed Sound invasion had passed them without much fanfare. Nobody really wanted to thank Konoha's demon bastard and Uzumaki had not the heart or patience to reply to the not-so-hostile glares that his parents had been married, thank you very much.

Konoha was rebuilt with a steady pace and he asked for nothing. The people of the Leaf went on as normal. Life continued. Sarutobi Hiruzen still sat tall and withered in his seat as the third Hokage, but he healed from his Mistake's actions and almost seemed content that the Snake Sannin was finally dead.

Hatake Kakashi was out with the last of Konoha's beloved Uchiha to train him up as an apprentice. He had taken Naruto's words mostly to heart and looked away from trying to 'help' the blonde when he had ignored him as a child, but the jinchuuriki knew to be watchful. Hatake may well get bored and come to watch.

Naruto stayed in Konoha because it was his territory; he has no concept of a home. However, buildings could be destroyed and salvaged and then built upon again. They were replaceable. He could clearly build a home elsewhere.

But animals did not just up and move for no reason. He had claimed this place as his and unless there was a monster that defeated him to claim Konoha as their own, he would not give his place away.

Three weeks after the failed invasion, Naruto was called to meat with the Hokage.

"Can I help you with something, ANBU-san?" He did not look up from his meal of meat and vegetable curry that had barely been taken from the oven. He sipped a bit of the steaming meal from a large spoon.

A dark cloaked ninja with a feline mask handed over a scroll but said nothing. With professional experience, the ANBU said nothing that was not important. "A summons."

Naruto took the scroll after setting down his pan. Without looking up, he directed the ANBU to step in. "Come in, ANBU-san. I would not want you to get a creak." The stranger did so but stayed standing and alert.

On the red ribbon was a graceful seal holding it closed that he knew to be a direct line from Sarutobi Asuma's father. He opened it and peered at its written contents. He gave a nod to tell the ANBU that he was off to follow orders.

Behind him, the ANBU put the delicious smelling stew back in the oven to stay warm before leaving as if they had never been there. Naruto would likely not appreciate the food wasting away to flies, and the ANBU member had no wish to end up like the previous (and now deceased) Owl member who had eaten Naruto's batch of cookies a year back. Sure, it had reportedly been delicious, but it had not been worth the consequent humiliation and then death that vengeful cook had granted the man.

**Real End.**


	2. Strange Day At Class

**Strange Day At Class  
><strong>by _Goddessa39_

Naruto is not mine.  
>Rated: T for Teen, for no reason.<br>Naruto/Hinata, possible Sakura/Sasuke, implied Neji/Tenten.  
>Genre: HumorParody...imagine that.  
>Timeline: Spoilers unsure, but they are about to have the Gennin test that begins it all.<p>

Summary: It is with a remarkable poise that Umino Iruka addressed his class who were all looking slightly off. He has no idea that they are back in time to change the world, and the destiny of Konohagakure, for the better. All he knows is that this is a strange day, indeed. This is just a scene.

Note: This is what I think may happen if a version of the Rookie 12 who had been close went back in time.

* * *

><p>The day dawned bright and early over the Village Hidden in the Leaves within the country of Fire. Birds flew in flocks upon the sky that shined with morning dew and the yellow ball of flames that began to creep over the edges of far off mountains and the occasional canopy seemed to smile over the people.<p>

Up in his white tower in the center of the village-though at the edge of the populated town, the Sandaime Hokage sat upon his comfortable chair and glowered over at his paperwork. "You will be defeated," he mumbled angrily. "For I am the Hokage of this village and I will not be beaten by the likes of you." His eyes were hard and the lines upon his face seemed to be tuned in edge to give him the appearance of sharp features.

There was no other sound in reply but the silence was deafening. In his quiet hatred, the old man rubbed at the bottom of one of his aching knees and glowered. This is not going to be a good day, he thought, but there was also no way he would let it go undefeated. With a tired sigh coming from a man who knew he was too old to be 'doing this shit,' he sat up and reached forward to the carefully piled paperwork.

It would not do to let it get larger.

But maybe, he thought, it would be okay if he called Naruto for some ramen. He would rather his wallet lighter than the pile to remain, and Naruto always managed to lose him a few papers.

* * *

><p>Umino Iruka stepped into his class the minute the clock struck the appropriate time. He had one of his favorite jutsus primed, but to his surprise there was no use call for.<p>

He did not have to call out loudly to a misbehaving knucklehead or get some of the girls to shut up their squalling.

The class was mostly quiet.

Huh, he thought dumbly, will wonders never cease. And indeed it was something to be looked at and savored because classes of children-civilian or ninja alike-are packs of misbehaving enemies. The students were all in their usual seats though a few were a touch at odds with their normal routines.

Given, Nara Shikamaru was snoring lightly at his seat, and Akimichi Choji was snacking from a large back of potato chips that were taboo within the school, but generally ignored for that clans sake.

"Good morning, class." He greeted them like usual and got an unusual unusual reply.

Hyuuga, Yamanaka and one of the girls that was there as 'support' gave a half-hearted and echoing "Good morning sensei," but others were silent. Oh, Iruka knew better than to expect an answer from the sleeping Nara or the silent Shino from one of the clans that dealt in bugs, but others were strange.

The pink headed girl who was usually screeching along with Ino at brain-bleeding levels gave a low groan like a steam engine.

Iruka had to stop a moment and think of where that simile came from. What was a steam engine, he thought, before shrugging it away. The world of ninjas was fraught with death and terror and a strange level of 'what the fuck was that' that one had to learn to let the weird things, giant chakra beasts, and green spandex go.

A light shudder spread over the man at the half-thought-conscious of Konoha's Green Beast because the Green Beast Clone was one of the two boys that were there for 'support.' Something about their sensei having a 'competition' with his 'greatest rival' for their 'precious students.' He shuddered again. And that is why, Iruka told himself, I went into classroom teaching.

The 'clone' himself had his mouth in a seemingly permanent smile. His open mouth showed very white teeth that seemed to 'ping' in the light of the early sun. Iruka had to look away less he blind himself, though he did not wish to ask about it. The badly drawn curves of a smile over closed eyes were curious but Iruka thought to himself, you are too much a sane man and low class ninja to bother with other's oddities. Just let it go, and he did.

"What's wrong with Naruto?" he asked the class instead, because they did not seem to be bothered that the usually lighted up boy was quiet and seemed to tossed atop his desk like an old piece of driftwood. His chest was face up and his eyes were large and blank staring forward at nothing. He was dragging his hand in front of his face and his lips moved but even for a lip reader, the words were random and too insane to contemplate by a man of Iruka's sort who would rather keep his sanity than to understand a deranged child.

Most of the class seemed to look at the boy, look at Iruka, and shrug. The odd synchronous attitude was shocking and the teacher had to resist the temptation to call in a platoon of ANBU to test for infiltrators, though he knew no one could ever make themselves stand in for Naruto. No one would dare.

There were only two people who seemed untouched by the group mind of the class, though they too were in odds of their usual attitudes. Uchiha Sasuke had his head flat on the desk and was snoring louder than the Nara. This was in contrast to his usual stoic and unaffected airs. He must be catching a rest from his fan girls, Umino thought, before looking up to the two most loudly fawning of the previous fan girls. Yamanaka was blonde and bubbly but she had a new and more appropriate outfit that consisted of a weapons pouch, a leather whip, and a set of fishnet underclothing to go beneath her dress.

Iruka had heard about her mother so dismissed the whip lest he get a nosebleed.

Haruno Sakura had her head on the desk as well, and her eyes were half open. Through the slitted lids, Iruka could see bloodshot veins running through her eyes. A large blue ice pack was pressed around and under her head, doubling as a pillow.

"Are," he began slowly and unsurely, "are they drunk?" The class was silent and not meeting his eyes, as if they actually knew. Iruka closed his eyes and pursed his lips, tracing over the large scar that ran the length of his nose almost to his eye before taking a deep breath that all teachers of adolescents seemed to learn.

"Why," he lamented loudly and towards his favored student, "why are you drunk?"

Naruto said nothing but his giggling was enough to make them all shiver as he ran his hand up and down over his eyes in fast motions. It was a deranged laugh though not deep enough to cause Iruka to think of his tenant. Instead, the teacher made a few hand signs and was confused and astounded when his 'Kai' did nothing. He tried again to dismiss a major illusion and gave it some extra power, but nothing was dismantled.

Iruka's big-head-no-jutsu activated unconsciously as a headache began to build behind his eyes; His mouth opened with a firm frown line and his question of "Uzumaki, Uchiha, Haruno!" sounded more like a shouted "UzuChiHaruno!"

Haruno Sakura gave a yelp and started whining lowly as she clutched her head. Uchiha had shot up, failed to stand, fallen and hit his head on the desk, successfully knocking himself back out. Bastard-that was probably to his luck. Naruto looked up at his beloved 'Iruka-sensei' before looking back at his hand. His eyes went wide in almost fear before he shouted "But I am in the service of the Orange!" and attempting to bite his own digits off like a wild animal that had come to realize that yes, fingers should not be green and purple.

Nara poked his head up, took a look at the strange scene, actually had the force of strength to role his eyes before going back to his nap with an unheeded murmur of, "Troublesome."

Iruka had to ignore his own urge to run from the room and find someone else who would 'Kai' him or at least make sure he was not sleeping. I don't know if I should trust anyone here to pinch me, he thought. He was about to intervene when his view was taken up by the shy Hyuuga heiress.

"Ano," she said quietly, touching Naruto on the head where he let go of his hand and fell unconscious on the floor. "Sensei, please do not mind them," she began with more words said aloud that made her face go redder and redder as she caught the attention of the class. "Lee-kun challenged Naruto-kun to an eating contest." She did not look at Choji who had already returned home when curfew came.

In response, Tenten held the boy up by the scruff of his neck and Umino had the image of a wet dog covered in some sort of green substance that began to crawl like old dishes left in the sink for a few months too many.

"Unfortunately, things got a little out of hand, and someone got hold of some other ingredients," for this, Iruka told himself the girl did not actually glare [because Hinata did not know how to of course] at Kiba's furry master.

At this point, Mizuki walked in, took one strange look on the floor where Naruto had collapsed. The man did not grin but he did have to withhold the urge to kick the downed demon. "I have the test ready," he said before turning around and walking out. No way am I going to ask about this, he murmered to himself. He did not want to be involved.

Iruka followed him then because he was not sure he wanted to know any more, either.

When he left, Hinata took the time to reattach Naruto's hand and two of his fingers seamlessly. With a hand motion the blood cleaned itself and disappeared. "Naruto-kun, you should have known better than to inhabit class-S narcotics," she murmured but it held no ill will. Part of this was because she loved him, part of it was because she was not really mad. After all, he needed some way to fail the exam and by now, every time someone said 'bunshin' he had his favorite jutsu so ingrained that a Kage bunshin appeared somewhere near him automatically.

Besides, it was not her orange-loving-boyfriend's fault. It was her teammate's. Nearby, Kiba shivered. Nearby him, and behind a cloth, Shino-of-bugs gave a malicious smirk. "Kiba is in trouble," he murmered to himself. The others heard him but ignored it. There were ninja of more troubling and wierd characteristics than Shino's occasional occupation of kicking a dog [Kiba, not Akamura] when it was down. "How do I know this?" Nobody responded though the class heard him. "Because women are evil."

A kunia wrapped in thick paper flew across the room, hit Shino in the head, and the bug boy fell off his seat with a groan. Nobody saw the female of Team 8 do this-or at least they did not say anything. She did, after all, have control of her teammates now. After Kiba's master's little... indescretion, she had to of course root out the misbehavior while she could.

In contrast, Tenten smacked Lee on the back of the head. The boy squealed like a pig strapped to a pit before passing out in pain. Neji just looked up at his teammate. Nobody needed to call him on it but Kiba whispered "whipped" into the room in which he got a kunai stuck very close to his 'other friend.' It stayed lodged into the replaceable wood of the chair so the mut had to stand slowly and get a new chair.

Hey, this is a ninja classroom. There were always a stack or chairs nearby when new seats were needed.

Akamura, the very perverted and devious one of the pair just grinned unnaturally like what no one in the Naruto verse would identify with 'Cheshire.' Even if they did, they would not say it because Akamura hated cats.

Eventually, all of them passed, except for Naruto, because he would not wake from his forced slumber. Umino Iruka in comparison, said nothing more than was required before going to get a drink and forgetting what he could of the class after the day was done with. The alcohol would do nothing to change the even that would occur later that night.

* * *

><p><strong>END?<strong>

Okay, that's all I have for that. Basically, the four Gennin team students came back in time en masse. Naruto needed a way to get his favorite move [Kage Bunshin of course] so he needed to not pass immediately because he could not just fail to show up. Hence, he and Lee had an eating contest of curry or something, but Naruto just turned it into ramen until Akamura slipped something else in which made the orange knucklehead pretty unresponsive.

Tenten is there for support. Plus she just wants to watch. Pup-err, I mean Neji just does whatever his girlfriend says.

And Sakura and Sasuke may be together or not. Either way, Sakura could not be allowed to drink alone, but while drunk she cannot make herself sober so she and Sasuke are suffering for it. Though why someone from the other teams did not help them out, I do not know.


	3. A Most Youthful Conversation

**A Most Youthful Conversation  
><strong>by _Goddessa39_

Konoha and the ninja population of awesomeness do not belong to me.

Rated K for Kids who read it… or T for perverts-to-be, and an explosion of youthful noise.

Characters: …a youthful ninja and his apprentice, as well as scary people…including a green beast.

Note: This came out of nowhere from may rare and ill populated humor creations. It had no where to go though, so officially became a one-shot. I find it very odd because most if not all is in spoken word. Huh.

HUMOR!

* * *

><p>AAAAAAHHHHH! The <em>scream ignited energy into the nearby... ninjas<em>.

_One ran over._ My most beloved student, please calm down! Take a breath!

Sempai-oh sempai! But-but-but-but-?

My most beloved student, remember what I said.

That it's okay to be a freak?

No, but that too is good thinking. No, what I said was that some things, a ninja will just have to stay strong to get through.

And other things can be repressed?

Yes, my favored student. _Nod-nod-nod._

But-but sempai, where are your most-beloved-and-honored colors?

Whimper. I have reeled in a new sensei, my friend.

Why, sempai? You already had one.

It is true that a sensei is important, but also is the righteousness of one's teachings, like the kindness of impolite strangers.

What?

He dissed me for a teme-genius, my good brother.

A genius? What's wrong with those?

Oh, my, tsk tsk tsk. Konohamaru, I have another lesson.

Yes sensei?

Remember that a genius may come once in a generation... or in a classroom of idiots. But it is the cleverness of an actor, the skill of a hard worker, and the creativity of an idiot that will trump them in the end.

Really sempai?

Yes, my friend. It is like my good fellow-student, Rock Lee knows. As another who is considered lower than low by a genius, Lee-kun knows that as much as he falls in chakra, as much as he knows less in academics, there is still the moment in the end of battle when he uses his all out of the kindness of the heart, the love of the fists, and the duty to all awesome battle that we are superior because no matter what those so called 'geniuses' think they know, there is no fate but what we can make it.

Awesome! Is he as great as you, sempai?

I'd like to think so, young brother.

So why do you not have your colors, big brother?

Ah. _Wince_. Remember, young growing ninja may have their eccentricities, even perversions, but every ninja of great stock must also have his loyalties. Like a man going into a brothel to spy as one of the prostitutes, if something works once, it may just work again. …Although, it is also important to think outside of the brothel plan for more back-up plans.

Like our girl-forms.

Yes, Ko. The village my think of my beautiful and wonderful and tenderly awesome Oroike and frown, but despite the fact that it is a beautiful, hot female in their face doing things they have no past history of, it is also a very workable tool.

And fun.

Yes, Ko, it is also great fun.

Are all men perverts, sempai?

Every person has a little pervert in them, even me, and you too will know that special hell one day. But also remember that women in all forms are beautiful, but if they parade around naked all day, they are even less likely to form meaningful relationships.

Really? But who would do that?

Ah, Ko, this is a ninja village, and the Leaf is the greatest of all. But there are women, and occasionally men, out there who show off their bodies for one reason or another. Are you at all familiar with a beautiful woman by the name of Anko?

I don't think so.

She is a beautiful woman, but like me, there is something that society has decided in all of its backwards wisdom, to hate her for. And yet, like me and like Lee-kun, she perseveres. When she shows her body at all, it is not to get the notice of enemies or civilians, it is to catch the interests of those who do not know her and inform them with a slap in the face-

Or a kick in the balls?

Yes, Ko, or a kick in the balls. It is to tell the watching people who do not even try to get to know here that all of her beauty is on display and they will never touch it.

Really, so she's really kind inside?

I do not know, little brother. For the beauty that is Mitarashi Anko is slightly insane, but also far out of our range. For she is a true kunoichi.

Oh. What are they like?

Look at Tenten-chan. She is a mistress of the blade. Her body is important to her, it is true. But her streamlined curves and yummilicious smile is worth far more than a naked fan girl or a kind enemy. Do you agree?

_Blush._

Yes, sempai.

So if I told you that she would still slap Naruko, what would you think?

Really? But, but sempai? I thought that true kunoichi were smart and knew that-

Yes, Ko, they are often smart. But it is also true that even women have little perverts within them. They just hide it better. And in hiding this feature of growing selves and The Blushing Roots of Youthfulness, the female race overcompensates.

Do you mean over-react?

Yes, my brother. That too.

...I don't know if I believe that, sempei.

...trust me Ko. I am dating a wondrous and beautiful kunoichi who cares more for the actions and reactions of her body than the attraction of a resident genius. She is no fan girl and blushes quite wonderfully. But even then, I am more likely to find myself pinned beneath stone than I am to drink to find peace.

...I kind of like that, sempai?

Yes Konohamaru. I know. Hanabi-nii-chan too has an inner child just waiting with bated breath to break free. She is too young for the perversion of adulthood to take form, but all of those wonderful and beautiful decisions lay in her future.

_Blush._

_Behind the wise pair, a couple of ninja with dark hair and bowl cuts, not to mention lime-green leotards that left little to the imagination besides all encompassing fear cried manly tears._

* * *

><p><strong>END<strong>

Two sayings I thought about including but didn't:

_Whatever kills the enemy and provides me a way out, gets me stronger._

_Skill trumps logic, but experience can trump skill. Luck trumps all things though, good or bad._

This turned out to be a study in writing, a rare time when Naruto received an awesome and other instructor, and some brotherly talk between two orphans. There are not quotes because most of it is spoken.

Author's Note:

Now listen guys and gals, as of 6/8/2011 at 10:48 in the morning Konoha Underground 473 has hits and 275 different visitors. While this is awesome, especially considering it is only two chapters [the first one is awesome, and the second just a scene] I have not got even one review. Why? Whywhywhywhywhy? I don't consider myself a great writer, and I can always use a beta [ANYONE INTERESTED?] I still would appreciate some notice that someone appreciated what I do on my down time or at least the twisted things that go on in my head.

Thank you. Rant over. Please enjoy this chapter and laugh at the Youthful Ninja Training Program.

**Reviews appreciated.**


	4. 11 Food Quotes for a Naruto Sentences

**Konoha Underground**

**11 Food Quotes for a Naruto Sentences**

For every quote, there is a moment of Naruto. Many are OC, AU, and they are not in any particular order. The only thing they have at all in common is A) Naruto, and B) Food.

* * *

><p><em>As a child my family's menu consisted of two choices: take it or leave it. ~Buddy Hackett<em>

With a belly full of hunger and mind full of negative cheer, the only edible things he can find is the crust on rusty trash cans and the paling cuts of meat. Naruto was hungr so he ate even if he never got enough.

_In Mexico we have a word for sushi: bait. ~José Simons_

When the yellow-haired ninja learns of Akatsuki, of the Uchiha and the whispered secrets Konoha should not know of, he thinks of a tall man with a sword and gills next to a patriot of horror whose blood is spread on the ground as fertilizer. He could use them to lure the others.

_What is patriotism but the love of the food one ate as a child? ~Lin Yutang_

The Rokudaime Hokage lays his hat respectfully in the center of the table. His red haired daughter with whisker marks tries to grab for it before the Rokudaime's wife laughs and pushes it farther away on the table. Then she takes his order.

_Everything I eat has been proved by some doctor or other to be a deadly poison, and everything I don't eat has been proved to be indispensable for life. But I go marching on. ~George Bernard Shaw_

The Sandaime Hokage would be horrified if he knew how many assassinations his ANBU had missed occuring against his 'grandson.' The Godaime Hokage, Senju Tsunade, cries in her office when she realizes how many times her 'grandson' had been targeted by councilmen and civilians alike. Haruno Sakura will never realize why her ex-teammate had a belly made of steel and why it was necessary to not touch the liquids that ran from the hole in his stomach after one particularly vicious fight.

_I will not eat oysters. I want my food dead - not sick, not wounded - dead. ~Woody Allen_

As a child, as a ninja, and as a kid likely to not get fed, Uzumaki Naruto had eaten his share of strange food. The ninja rations were made of, he was pretty sure, poison cardboard. That blue meat with crawling maggots tasted more like that glowing moss he had tried one time. The tiny frog he swallowed one time (and never spoke of) felt like curry going down and burning a hole in his belly. But when he had the means to pay and the attention to buy without getting ripped off, Naruto never ate anything with eyes or a caricature that it was once living.

_The most remarkable thing about my mother is that for thirty years she served the family nothing but leftovers. The original meal has never been found. ~Calvin Trillin_

Naruto is a product of the underside of Konoha-the part that is cursed and unspoken. It is not until he is dating a girl that he has a home-cooked meal only comparable by Ramen-the-first-beloved.

_The more you eat, the less flavor; the less you eat, the more flavor. ~Chinese Proverb_

A starving fledgling will see a piece of bread and eat is slowly to savor a single nutrient. An Akimichi will stuff his face with an apple or an orange and taste nothing. Ramen, Naruto knows, can go down quickly, but he never forgets a sip.

_The whole of nature, as has been said, is a conjugation of the verb to eat, in the active and in the passive. ~William Ralph Inge_

The circle of life, it is said, is everything. Air and the earth nurture the bugs and the plants that make it up the food chain. A cow is served so that a lion and a man may eat. A tree falls so that a man may eat the cow. Eventually even the man will die and the tree and the air will be repaid. All ninja know this.

_Cheese - milk's leap toward immortality. ~Clifton Fadiman_

The field rations are tasteless at the same time that they are disgusting. The rest of Team 7 are shocked when their blonde dobe pulls out a small time storage note with a large slab of cheese. He takes a small slice. The rations go down a lot better then.

_There is no sight on earth more appealing than the sight of a woman making dinner for someone she loves. ~Thomas Wolfe_

Hyuuga Hinata has never thought of herself as beautiful, though she looks like any other Hyuuga in her family with the dark eyes and pale, pupil-less eyes. "Honey, I'm home!" Naruto shouts to a new house, and his girl is at the stove. He sneaks up behind her, calls her beautiful, kisses her, and then swallows some of her burnt onion mush. This time, she believes him.

_My soul is dark with stormy riot,  
>Directly traceable to diet.<br>~Samuel Hoffenstein_

In the end, Naruto gives up on Konoha, on the village, the people within, and a hat he had deeply wished to wear. His heart is battered with hatred and he knows little of anything else. He is a wolf now, and it is the heart of the animal side of the forest that feeds him. He'll die to protect it, and he'll kill for it too.

_I'm trying to eat better. And, I do feel wise after drinking tea. After eating vegetables, I just feel hungry. ~Carrie Latet_

Despite the series of short-chaning that is a conspiracy, Naruto does do as he is bid. He wants to get bigger, grow stronger, reach the heigh the Hokage and then even higher. Unfortunatly, the vegetables (even when in good condition) just make him feel hungrier. He can eat a whole head of lettuce and still feel starved. In the end, he tells Teuchi-sama to "just put some more vegies in my ramen."

* * *

><p><strong>END<strong>

So?

Quotes were found at www (dot) quotegarden (dot) (com).


	5. Dobe's Smile Obito, Naruto

**The Dobe's Smile  
><strong>[Originally called "Obito's Smile"]

By _Goddessa39_

Inspired by _Lucillia_

Naruto is not mine. I make not money off his orangeness. The END.

Rated T for Teen

As for pairings and characters, there are mentions of Minato/Kushina, [with one-sided Rin/Kakashi, Naruto/Sakura,] and Rin/Obito-Naruto/Hinata.

Naruto, Obito, and what they have in common…in pieces.

Or… Naruto, Obito, and the lines drawn in-between.

* * *

><p><strong>Naruto, Obito, and…Minato.<strong>

Uzumaki [Namikaze] Naruto has always known who is father was. Even if he was blind, the familiar blonde hair and blue eyes would be obvious in its reflection. He smiles because Minato-sensei is his dad. It's a sad smile though, because Minato-sensei is also dead.

Naruto does not remember much of his [second] birth but the drama and horror going on is burned into his eyes as if he had the Sharingan to use. Kyuubi tails flail angrily and Minato seals an intricate design upon his belly.

Neither version of the boy [newborn or remembered] blames Namikaze Minato for sealing Kyuubi no Kitsune into him. There are far worse babies that could have been used. Imagine an Uchiha or Hyuuga with the threat of the Kyuubi, the Nine Tailed Demon Fox behind them. Madara would have giggled.

* * *

><p><strong>Naruto, Obito, and… Kushina.<strong>

Minato-sensei had taken Kakashi in because Hatake was his apprentice, but Kushina-san had welcomed both Rin and Obito in with open arms. It had been Kushina-sempei who had taught them how to handle a knife and to insult the enemy into rash anger; how to talk to a stranger as well as a friend.

Naruto is angry every time he yells his name out loud and no one remembers the awesome woman who bore him and loved him in both lives.

* * *

><p><strong>Naruto, Obito, and…Kakashi.<strong>

"_I am Uchiha Obito and I will surpass you once I awaken my Sharingan!"_ Obito shouted that to Kakashi once-upon-a-time and now he just feels ashamed.

Sometimes when he dreams in hazy red and grey, Naruto sees the Monument of the Dead Ninja through Obito's open left eye.

* * *

><p><strong>Naruto, Obito, and…Sakura.<strong>

Every time Naruto sees Sakura, Obito remembers Rin. It is not right, and certainly not fair, but every time he sees, her he has to confess the love that Rin never heard.

Sakura resembles Rin, sometimes. But in truth, the pinkette is nothing like the soft girl in his memories.

Sometimes, Naruto thinks he likes Sakura because she likes Sasuke who is a quasi-Kakashi. It is a familiar routine even death could not completely break. A Gennin team is supposed to be your second family. For Obito and Naruto, it was. A Gennin team is not supposed to change, either, but it did.

* * *

><p><strong>Naruto, Obito, and…Sandaime Hokage.<strong>

Sarutobi Hiruzen and Uchiha Obito were not close and said very few words between them. However, the Hokage was aware of the ostracision the boy faced. In turn, he gave the boy to a sensei of a man who could keep him strong and happy where the Uchiha failed. Later, he will give Hinata to Kurenei for the same reason.

It is a pity that he failed Naruto; he could have given him to Yuuhi Kurenei as well and things would have turned out far better for the two growing youngsters. Instead, the jinchuuriki is handed to the student of his father in the hope of greatness opening up. Unfortunately, that boat sailed with a cut out eye, a dead clan, and the ignorance of youth and age.

* * *

><p><strong>Naruto, Obito, and…Sasuke.<strong>

Naruto is not actually jealous of Sasuke. Obito got another chance at life and he wants the same for his cousin; unfortunately, the last of the Uchiha is an idiot.

* * *

><p><strong>Naruto, Obito, and… the Uchiha.<strong>

Obito had always been a failure in his father's eyes.

He is sad to see that Obito's blood is dead, but Naruto will never forgive the Uchiha Clan for being traitors.

Obito is born Uchiha so the blood limit is there in possibility. It is not coincidence that the Sharingan only activated after he found his family [Rin and Kakashi and Minato-sensei] in Team 7. He could have been heralded as a prodigy at the age of six.

* * *

><p><strong>Naruto, Obito, and…the Ichiraku Ramen Stand.<strong>

Obito does not love ramen, though he likes it well enough. Kushina does love ramen so they dine with sensei's girlfriend quite often.

Before Iruka takes him for lunch and before he could even speak fluently, Ichiraku Ramen was one of Naruto's favorite places to eat. For a long time, before all of his memories come back to him, it is one of his only happy memories.

Ichiraku Teuchi has always thought of Naruto as family, even if he wasn't. Kushina was one of his best customers, after all.

* * *

><p><strong>Naruto, Obito, and… Irony of Bridges<strong>

Obito dies on a mission to destroy the _Kannabe Bridge_ (the Bridge where the Gods DO NOT Help). His Sharingan eyes develop and he gives one to Kakashi in the end so the stupid Jounin will get out of there and live, even if they will have to leave him. In the second life, he helps to build and secure the _Great Naruto Bridge._ Before its finished, he has to pick Kakashi up. Afterwards, Sasuke's eyes develop.

He is the dobe, the dead-last, the weakest link despite the fact that the kunoichi is not all suns and giggles either. Nobody sees him coming but the one who could not speak up. Itachi [Konohamaru] was like his little brother, even if he could not save him in the end.

* * *

><p><strong>Naruto…and…Obito.<strong>

Naruto is Obito is Naruto, and it is hard to change. He starts small. His jacket of blue and white with orange fringe is now an orange jacket with a white and blue fringe. Instead of a fan, there is a blue swirl on the side.

If he were not Obito, Naruto wonders sometimes in his darkest moments, he thinks that he might have become like Gaara. Even Kyuubi no Kitsune rolls her eyes.

The blonde gaki learns not to cry pretty early. The lady at the orphanage screamed bloody horror when his left eye dripped with blood. When he wants to cry, he shuts his eyes tightly and curls his mouth so that it looks like a smile.

* * *

><p><strong>Hinata, Rin, and…Naruto and Obito.<strong>

Hinata does not remember much of being Rin beyond a few dreams, but she does remember a spiky haired boy that might be Naruto but is Not!Naruto as well confessing his love for her at a ramen stand.

She wants to spread her wings from the Hyuuga, but knows she never can. Still, she will learn to heal the pain and scratches in case Naruto ever needs her [again] while also learning how to fight back. She got killed by one Cloud ninja when she could not fight back and refuses to ever again.

If Obito were not an Uchiha, Rin would have had not troubles seeing him for a worthy person. If Hinata were not a Hyuuga, she would have kissed him the first time she saw him as children even if he was still in his cootie stage, and Naruto would have had not qualms of courting her openly.

The last time she saw him and both first times she sees the other young ninja in training, she thinks that he has beautiful eyes. As Rin, she cuts what's left of one out as his last request to a fellow that does not deserve it.

* * *

><p><strong>END.<strong>

How was that? Did you like it? The basic idea is that Obito is Naruto is Obito. It is a reincarnation drabble series.


	6. Konoha's Stacked Deck

Konoha Underground Chapter 6: Konoha's Stacked Deck

_**Konoha's Stacked Deck**_

Words of whispering enemies shout, do not anger Konoha for they may send out the stacked deck.

* * *

><p>[<strong>Inuzuka Kiba <strong>is a pair of twos, deuce. Maybe he is not the most brillian jewel but he is canny with **Akamura**. As a pair of deuce, they can beat any lone card.]

[**Akimichi Choji **is like a straight and the bigger he gets the more numbers and suits he calls to him.]

[**Shino **is a Jack, of spades usually. He is neither the best or the worst but he has a unique perspective. If you add him to others he is sure to come out well.

[**Shikamura **is a king though of what suite it hardly matters. He is high strung and dependable but like a chess piece he does not move much; he is a basis of focus people use.]

[**Tenten **is a number and not a royal piece. She is also random. She can be anyone below and calls on weapons. The busier she is, the higher ranked.

[**Neji **is a ten-the highest number available but also sure of his rank. It could be said that he is a genius but on the battlefield, he too learned the hook of a blonde ranked as a dobe.]

[**Sakura **could a queen, this one of clovers, by those who are built around her. Instead she lowers herself because she is not greatly skilled naturally. She is a nine who could be a six. **Haruno Sakura **varies her places in the line. Maybe she is a nine and bowing to royalty, or maybe she is a six and ignored; like the flip of a coin, only those who can use her know what she is.]

[Her friend **Ino **takes **Sakura's **supposed place as a Queen of the green. She is beautiful and friendly, but also guarded within the village. Her skills go to legendary lengths when her mind is activated.]

[**Lee-kun **is a jack much like his teammate. His development may have been stunted but he is powerful. There are those better than him but he can freely admit that and never gives up on training.]

[**Hyuuga Hinata **is born in the mirror of diamonds and keeps her Queenship. However, it is largely contested by the majority of her suite and she still holds out her hands. It is in the strength of her fight, her ability and her soul that she keeps her head high, her crown set but move her diamond-hard following into red hearts with the help of the rest of the deck.]

[**Sasuke **is an ace, not by ability or birth as he thinks but because he has become important. Any lonely card can be beaten by him and his eyes but he forgets that the others are important too and in some cases, he is simply an unmarked one, the weakest of all things.]

[**Kankuro **is a solid eight, an unlimited number of wood within sand and two face that could be real or fake or solid. Though he has room for growth he is comfortable surrounded by others.]

[**Temari **is a born a three, just one more kunoichi to be buried by sand and blood. Having siblings brings her up to a nine, strong and independent but in no way the best. Trust and family creates her in the image of a queen, diamond sharp and strong and just try to break her against her brothers.]

[**Gaara **is an interchangable jack and king and born for it. He hates and is used but learns to fight with and for. Love comes after hate.]

[**Naruto **is the different one. His life has not shaped his marking completely. He is born a seven, that number both lucky and unlucky. It is likely he would have become greater, maybe a king or a jack in an easier life, but this is not that one. Like **Sasuke**, **Naruto **is made into an unsuited ace card, thanks to fire and brimestone and and unloving villagers. But no, **Uzumaki Naruto **is something else. Despite birth and death and hatred, and maybe because of them, he is the Joker. He is used only in times of peril or at random and everything falls under his gaze.]

* * *

><p>END.<p>

Yeah, not a real story piece, but interesting. I have had this on file for years, waiting to use it. Yeah... not gonna happen I'm pretty sure. Enjoy Ya'll and Happy Almost Momma's Day!


	7. Smoke That Rocks the Cradle

**The Smoke that Rocks the Cradle**

_Naruto is dead but he left so much behind._

* * *

><p>Tsunade gets his heart going, despite the fact that he is down a lung, his hands will never quite be the same, and there is a trail of blood from a legendary battlefield to the hospital. His heart beats again.<p>

And then his body dissapears in a cloud of smoke.

* * *

><p>There is a room in her small house somewhere between the Inuzuka and Aburama home grounds. It is two story, three bedroom, two bathroom. The spare room is empty for the momement, just awaiting whichever loved one gets worried first. Sometimes when one of the other Konoha Eleven, The Rookies that are twelve (now just eleven or ten people) and four teachers gets injured and stays the night there so the hospital is not bothered by too many ninja just begging for an escape.<p>

Her room is dark. The lights are out and a candle brightens up her figure in the dark just enough. It is cool out, quiet, peaceful, and Niha is still sleeping. Slowly, it blows out as if a finger clenched around it while she wasn't sleeping.

There is a trail of smoke, a white thing like a ghost finger. She follows it without a sound down the hall to the next room over. The door is closed and she dare not open it. Instead, she leans her head against the wooden door and listens for the noiseless sounds on the other end.

Niha is not asleep after all, and there is a voice that does not speak and a sound that is not there. Music that has no ear or mouth erupts like tree whispers and Hinata does her best not to cry out, not to explode, not to break through the door.

She knows if she walks through the door, he will not be there. So she will see him in her dreams.

* * *

><p>Shikamura gets in over his head one time in Whale country. The bulbous hills like porpous backs and the bent edges that occur long after volcanos make flukes of the land and the darkness user hits his back against and edge hard enought to make his vision waver. Oh, he isn't out of the game-any ninja worth their kunai learns some blind fighting, but he is surrounded.<p>

He thinks later, that out of the corner of his eye, he sees the light of the moon through the trees and the hazy, smokey look of it went to bright dashes of color before the six around him that he had not captured in their places die. Maybe it was orange, or blue, or just the sparkling stars in his waivering vision.

The Hokage will not want to hear of this-the anger in her eye (at herself, at Konoha, at all of them who could not save a blonde brat) but his team will listen and not disbelieve and at the next bar when one of their old comrades who know the strange occurances that occur, well, they will listen.

And if there is a man with old, sad eyes and a scratch scar on his nose who listens from within a bottle, well, par for course.

* * *

><p>Sasuke has gone to Orochimaru. The curse scar moves like worms among his skin and the snake sannin makes his skin crawl in a different way. He has betrayed his country and his fellows and his childhood ideals. He has betrayed his team and, Naruto- well, he is dead.<p>

"You cannot defeat me, you bastard."

It echoes in the shadows but the dark haired boy with vengeance on his heart does not react because crazy is just another state for a ninja and no one else seems to hear it.

"How could you do this?"

Its the voice of a dead boy, a not-yet-man, but he is used to killing those now too. Even if it is to put them out of their misery of torture and a snake sannin's apprentice's experiments.

"You need to go home."

He is alone now, and it is as dark here as ever. He doesn't mean to say it but- "I can't."

* * *

><p>When Naruto was very little, he was cornered by a horde of drunken people and beaten half to death before an ANBU came across them. He would never remember most of it but he always knew that none of them would see daylight again. What he does remember in a secret place in his heart is seeing the moon bright through hazy eyes. It was like a gas main nearby exploded and the stars above twinkled as the light changed too quickly to adjust.<p>

But he remembers, if just for a moment, of no longer being on the earth, but part of it.

* * *

><p>Once upon a time a baby was born and he grew up to do great things. He loved and laughed and taught and killed a line of shinobi at the peak of the night with a single seal and a set of special kunai. And one day when a demon was broken free and terrorized a many people and killed many more shinobi, he called upon the death god to seal the thing into his infant son.<p>

The man should not have done this but he did anyway.

His wish that people would understand did not come true. Instead they idolized him and hated the son. But the boy was smart in a way many geniuses cannot be and he knew that to hate would just further the circle of darkness. So instead he loved all who looked at him. But he was just a boy and despite a ancient bloodline of pranks and ninjas who died for what they loved, his life had not been truly happy or healthy and he gave too much of himself.

He died a thousand, thousand times and a few more in every spar and never flinched. No one, not even him, had ever taken the time to analyze this and find out what it meant. Nobody seems to remember that he was born to a sage and deviled by a village.

* * *

><p>Tsunade wonders when she will get her necklace back. It is part of the curse that it will travel back to her even if she never sees the body of the last who held it.<p>

She will not.

And Senju Tsunade-hime, the fifth Hokage of Konoha, the last living member of clans Senju and arguably, Uzumaki; she will die thinking of it.

And though there are others that get their face on a mountain, and others still with the strength and belief in the village to be Hokage of Konoha, the necklace will not return from a single boy with the strenght of an army that stretches all the land.

There will never be a sixth hokage mentioned. Kakashi will take the seat, reluctantly, as the seventh, and Konohamaru will sit the eighth.

And when enemy villages wonder about that missing number all they will see is the smoke on the wind.

* * *

><p>Uzumaki Naruto fought and died, not for his village as many believed, but for his own worth. And when Sasuke launched against him for a fatal wound, a blonde found himself lacking. And so, he decided to accept that. Accept that no one would ever really love him or believe in him without something else in mind. Accepted that the world wasn't perfect and his friend could become enemy.<p>

And so he looked at the moon and then at his friend, the teammate who was betraying them and made a choice. He could not save Sasuke for his own heart that wanted friends, but he could save his village.

He scratches the other boy's hiataite not because he will not kill but because he knows if he did kill the Uchiha where no one could see then the town would just villanize himself and the other boy could walk into town as he pleased and kill anyone, hurt them.

Naruto may have fought for himself, once, and failed. But he fought for his loved ones and like his mother's people, died for it.

Perhaps the Kyuubi kept him alive through the Chidori through the chest. And perhaps the healing factor-a last gift by a forgotten village- kept him alive after that. But-

Uzumaki Naruto had made it a habit to give all he could.

And mayhaps he gave too much of himself. As he died, he stared up at the moon and remembered a night that was too hazy but in which he looked up at the smoke of the moon and-

Kage Bunshin!

"I will protect my loved ones!" he never said but meant.

_Believe it!_

* * *

><p><strong>END<strong> This has been sitting on my comp for... a very long time. And I doubt I will do anything more than this with it. So, I toss it into my Naruto-oneshot-listing a.k.a. "Konoha Underground."

...Niha is my imaginary Naruto/Hinata baby that came out of nothing years down the road. *shrugs* By the sound of the title you might get the idea that there were supposed to be more pieces. There were. They just never got written. Oh well.


	8. A Prophecy

**Konoha Underground**

A Naruto prophecy, because every canon story uses a few... this came to me a long time ago and I'm posting it now while I'm going through some of my fics. The last two lines are some of my favorite_: Cry the tears that life gave throughout; then take in air, and last, breathe out_. Its awesome. It could be the world ends thing or just a relief. Up to the reader really.

* * *

><p><strong>Naruto Prophecy – Beware<strong>

.

Beware the gods from up above,

They've felt no shame in what they've done.

The demons from, oh, far below,

Have stepped forth on mother Gaia's flow.

.

Eventually a sagely man,

Will put forth many a clan.

Earthly energy like blood in veins,

Will spawn a fighting, human strain.

.

When enemies of peace forgather,

A whirling land will be made slather.

But worry not for blood flows true,

And woman will produce anew.

.

Beware the wrath of maelstrom's birth,

For only truth will reveal his worth.

Puppet strings ravage the world,

And Dragon sighs safe wings unfurled.

.

Beware the coming of blue dawn,

when boy-child stands upon scorched lawn.

For great is he who looks about,

And still sees wonder and belief to spout.

.

Beware the trickster's bright red tail,

Who paints an innocent with a hatred veil?

Look atop the peaking, giant faces,

For the bright orange in one's hidden traces.

.

Beware the leaf upon the wind,

Folded wings that fall upon the sinned.

For savior's might is truly great,

But he too needs to find his mate.

.

Beware the power of the sky,

When earth and fire meet watery bird's eye.

Hidden places on the map,

Are not so much as a gift pre-wrapped.

.

Beware the sound of serpent's hiss,

But save the world with true loves kiss.

Watch the highly smiling orphan,

Knowing calamity will be held dormant.

.

Beware the touch of heaven's curse,

For everything will just get worse.

Know that with the precious friend,

Loss and death will strong backs bend.

.

Beware the revealing of the shining goddess,

Who is a shade bearing the given promise.

Find the blood in sand-sun-mud,

The ruins for a great woman's son.

.

Beware the time when Mau forgets,

How to keep the dead death-blessed.

And rat that carries, dry as bone,

And land in danger from its own.

.

Beware the range of red-cloaked hands,

And await the blue-eyes strengthening stand.

They say the world will end with eyes,

As cold as hate and fresh with lies.

.

Beware the looks of pained people,

And give your prayers to the painted steeple.

Bow your heads and raise your hands,

As tempest works across the land.

.

Beware at night when darkness comes,

And leaders high cannot face the sun.

Little ninja, woe be gone,

Will finally have hope in the chosen one.

.

Beware that history may be the past,

But don't forget the questions asked.

Remember what has happened here,

And hold your loved ones closely there.

.

Beware, oh gods, from up above,

The problems from the greatest love.

It will not just be an Earthly thing,

When angels sing of promising.

.

Beware the time when it ends in fire,

For crumbled earth does not inspire.

Cry the tears that life gave throughout,

Then take in air, and last, breathe out.

**END**


End file.
